Reconnecting XP Home to shared printer on a Windows 2000 Pro machi

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Guest

I have a laptop running XP home. It prints to a shared printer hosted on a
Windows 2000 Pro desktop.

The users on both machines are NOT the same.

I can connect and print with no problem by entering a user and password
defined on the 2000 machine when connecting the laptop to the shared printer
the first time. However, even if I click the Save Password checkbox, I get
access denied after logging off the XP home laptop or rebooting.

To try to figure this out, I set up a shared directory on the 2000 machine
and created a persistent mapping on the XP home machine with:
net use z: \\server\share password /user:username /persistent:yes
However, it too only works until the machine is rebooted or the user logs
off. Any attempt to access the share after logging back in results in
Access Denied.

The only way I have been able to get the printer to reconnect after
logout/reboot is to enable the Guest account on the 2000 pro desktop and give
guest access to the printer.

However, this isn't the ideal solution security wise.

Any help would be appreciated.
 
WGM said:
The users on both machines are NOT the same.
Click to expand...

Hi,

This is essentially your problem. In a peer-to-peer network (such as this),
access to resources on a Win 2K machine rely on the user accounts defined.
The best way to resolve this is to create a user account on the Win 2K
machine that is the same as the user account on the Win XP machine (both
username and password). Then, give the user account on the Win 2K machine
access to whatever you want it to access (such as the printer -- if the
printer already has "Users" defined for access, then this will be granted
automatically, since the new user will be part of the "Users" group). If
there are security concerns about this second user account, you can limit its
access in various ways to the Win 2K computer, such as "no local logon
allowed".

By having the same account on both computers, the security credentials are
automatically verified, rather than needing to specify secondary credentials.
Keep in mind that this will "break" if any changes happen (such as
re-sharing of the printer, or changing the Win XP account's password).

Best Wishes,
Kurosh
 
Thank you for your response. I think I tried using the same usercode and
password on both but I'm not sure.

Regardless, what's the purpose of saving the password or the /persistent:yes
option on net use if in fact the security credentials aren't saved for later
use?

Is it an XP home limitation or do I misunderstand something?
 
WGM said:
Thank you for your response. I think I tried using the same usercode and
password on both but I'm not sure.
Click to expand...

I would try again, making sure that you are indeed using the same username
and password on both. BTW, changing the name (via "User Accounts") does not
actually change the username -- it only changes the displayed name. If you
find this method is not working, then most likely the username and/or
password is mismatched. You can test this by creating a temp. user account
on both, with the same username and password. Make sure the account on the
Win 2K computer has access to the printer (either explicitly, or via the
"Users" group or another group). Then log in to the Win XP account and test.
Regardless, what's the purpose of saving the password or the /persistent:yes
option on net use if in fact the security credentials aren't saved for later
use?

Is it an XP home limitation or do I misunderstand something?
Click to expand...

Yes, this is an XP Home limitation. It's not designed for anything beyond
simple sharing and security. With the "Guest" account off, then you need to
explicitly allow access, as per the previous instructions.

You can read more about it here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/281660/

/persistent:yes does work for mapping drives (meaning the mapped drive will
re-connect at every logon) ... the problem is the alternate credentials won't
work persistently on XP Home. The best way to get around this is to use the
same credentials. Security-wise, this is better than specifying alternate
credentials anyways, since if they are two different users, the second user
would be connecting with the first user's credentials, and essentially would
have that same access to other shared resources during that session. By
using their own credentials, that account can be limited as necessary to
access. If it is the same person on both computers, and full access is
desired on both computers, then the best way is to ensure the account on both
computers is the same. (not use different accounts)

Best Wishes,
Kurosh
 
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